@hartng's Threads

I just read the put-down thread by @segalink where he addressed e-rodents questioning his acquisitions & making allusions. He has given me the energy to address the same ghouls who have insinuated that I speak because I eat from Government. A small thread of my life outside Govt.

I was in Govt from 2003 to 2011 serving 2 Governors of Abia State. I stepped aside when my service became untenable & relocated to Abuja where I became a most sought after event host. Bulk of my engagements were international. I travelled almost every month to different countries

Here I was in 2013 anchoring the African-Middle-East-Asia Women's Summit at the Atlantis Dubai. It was a 3-Day Summit & I was flown-in from Abuja to anchor the all-women Summit. 300 of them in attendance from all over the world. No mean feat. Not for amateurs.

I'll try as much as possible to convey my thoughts. Granted not everyone will get it but that's ok.

On this 3rd Force matter, our politics as currently set up at least at the Federal level dictates that only a candidate of one of the 2 main parties is guaranteed victory in 2019.

I get the frustration with the 2 main parties. Same old same old. Same set of people who got us here. I also get the moral standing of those who will rather not support either. It helps them sleep well at night & that shouldn't be interfered with. Perfectly ok by me.

So let's interrogate the likely outcome. You vociferously support a 3rd force candidate & on election day, a candidate from the major parties emerge winner. You are fulfilled that you stayed true to your conscience but the same people still end up in power despite your angst.

At some point, we really have to force-shutdown Nigeria. The type where you hold the power button down until the system shuts down. Then we uninstall all our current Apps & reinstall new ones 1 by 1. Every single National App is malfunctional. We can't continue like this.

Which sector will you actually say is working? Irrespective of the class you belong to, malfunction stares you in the face in all facets. Do we just bumble along hoping for a correction at some point? Reforms are even hot-wired to fail because of faulty foundations.

From infrastructure to health, education to banking, petroleum regime, ingrained corruption to government generally, everything is set up disfunctionally. We have gotten too used to disfunction. We cannot continue like this & aspire to any form of greatness anytime soon.

"Never get angry. Never make a threat. Reason with people," Don Corleone.

Everyone knows who Don Corleone is so I'll go straight to my point. Making threats are useless. It belittles you & gives you off as a coward. Those that 'do' don't threaten.

Sticking with the Godfather theme, when Sonny Corleone threatened to kill Carlo Rizzi, his sister, Connie's husband, everyone around relaxed because they knew for him to threaten Carlo openly, he wasn't going to do anything to him.

An abiding memory from my childhood growing up. We were seeing a movie 1 night in the house of a hard guy in my street & someone comes in & raises hell & threatens him. He was calm. Next morning, we saw the guy who issued threats with swollen eyes & cut lips. I put 2 & 2 together

So the narrative our opponents are trying to force down people's throats here is that the Ikpeazu administration has not done anything. I will run a thread of roads constructed by this administration in 3 years with names & location.

A young Russian boy was suffering a form of Cancer. He wrote to President Vladimir Putin requesting the President visits him as a dying wish. President Putin visited him in the hospital & the boy complained of absence of medical facilities to treat him. He died shortly afterwards

When Putin learnt of his death, he brought in German Doctors who specialised in the ailment the young boy died of & commissioned the building of a Specialist Hospital for that ailment. It was built & named after the boy, Dima Rogachev Oncology Specialist Hospital.

Because of that hospital, cases of child deaths from Cancer-related ailments have dropped by 90% in the region. German Doctors still run it, training their Russian counterparts. It is also a Teaching Hospital for Doctors to Specialise in the field of Oncology.

Had an interesting long conversation this morning with my friend Chioma Nwigwe on the concept of development plans & empowerment programmes. I need a wider take on her perspective & perhaps, links to available literature on the topic. Kindly follow through.

It started when I complained to her that I recently had a meeting with my community folk where I muted the possibility of setting up a library in the community. It was resoundingly rejected. Loudest ovation was for speaker who said they had to eat 1st to be able to read books 😢.

Community folks basically asked me to share whatever money I intended to use to use for the Library project among them so they can eat as that was their priority for now. Food. And not any useless Library! My friend Chioma took their side. What a betrayed!!